age of pink
by BlazingLegend
Summary: Barney has a slightly skewed definition of chemistry. 1,400 words, oneshot.


Once again, more two year old stuff I wrote on tumblr (literally all I did was copy & paste, it's that sad).

 **Rating:** K+.

 **Characters:** Barney & Robin. ('cause they're swarkles, bitch)

 **Time:** I dunno… a high school au, I guess. You can work the rest.

 **Prompt from** **otpprompts:** Imagine your OTP in Chemistry class. Something explodes, stuff happens, and all of a sudden person A has their hair dyed pink with person B attempting to calm them down. OT3 bonus: Person C is taking pictures on their phone to "preserve the memory" of Person A looking adorable with pink hair.

 _A/N:_ I wrote this in like twenty minutes so no judging if it's absolute crap. (And it spiralled a little. Just saying.)

* * *

"No."

" _No._ "

Both Barney and Robin blink on in horror.

"But, but—with _her?_ "

"Anyone but him!"

Lily pops up from behind, poking Robin in the shoulder. "Come on. It might not be so bad. You might even like him!"

Robin glares back, " _Unlikely._ "

Barney puffs out his chest, glowering, "Hey! I'm right here. And I have ears!"

"Oh, well done, you're just like everybody else," Robin throws back at him, then leans back into Lily, "You have got to be kidding. Him? I'd rather work with a diseased pirate!"

"Well, you never know, he may have STDs," Lily says with a shrug.

" _What?_ "

"You said diseases! I was grasping at straws!"

Robin lets out a small growl and whirls around, ripping the sheet off the corkboard. "There must be some mistake. Is there another Robin Scherbatsky in this class?!"

Barney pouts at her and tugs the sheet out of her hands. He gives it a quick scan, then sighs, "Nope. Looks like we're stuck with each other."

Robin combs her hands through her hair. "Crap."

"Oh, are you gonna go all she-Hulk on me? I would pay to see that."

Robin's face ignites into a scowl and she lunges for him, "I swear to God—!"

"Whoa," Lily declares, tugging Robin back by the elbows while she seethes and spits, "Slow your roll there, Scherbatsky. You don't want to be suspended." No one catches it as she mutters, "… again."

"Damn you and your strange feats of strength," Robin mutters.

Barney smirks over and the two of them. "Scherbatsky, huh?" he says. His eyebrows lift, "I think I like it."

Robin flashes her big blue eyes in Lily's direction. " _Please_ can I kill him?"

"No."

"Damn."

Barney sniggers. "Oh," he says, and gestures between the two girls, "But you two make such a cute couple."

Lily's eyes flame and her cherry-covered lips twist into a scowl. " _What_ did you just say?"

"Go on, you can start making out, I don't mind."

" _You… son of a bitch!"_

"Ah ah ah," Robin says, smirking as Lily tries to tear at him, "If I'm not allowed to kill him, you most certainly aren't."

" _But what if I make it look like an accident?"_

"No dice."

Lily breathes, her face scrunching, and she mumbles, "Everybody knows I'm in a committed relationship with Marshall…"

Barney grimaces. "Ugh. Monogamy. Just wonderful." He says. Then he pauses, and starts to grin again, "But you know, Lily, I wouldn't go as far as to say your relationship with Marshall doesn't still qualify as girl on girl."

Lily blinks. "Did he just say what I think he said…?"

"Uh, no, no, you're mistaken," Robin says, and takes Lily back to her seat (because she's still not so sure there won't be another murder attempt today) but not before mouthing a flash of _bastard_ in Barney's direction.

He grins.

When she gets back, she hitches her shoulders, and attempts to look Barney in the eye. (It's hard, though. It feels like staring into a pot of face-melting acid.) "So, how are we going to do this?"

"I could easily make some rude, sexual comment about that, but for the sake of preserving our friendship I'm going to restrain myself."

She scowls. "Since when have we ever been friends?"

"Well don't you know how to hit a man where he's weakest?" he says, tilting his head at her, "Of course we're friends, Scherbatsky."

"First of all, _don't_ call me Scherbatsky. Second of all, I don't think before right now you've ever actually looked me in the eye!"

"But where else would I be looking—okay, no, I can't pull that off."

"No you can't," she says, and puffs at her fringe. "I'm going to go ask the teacher if I can change partners."

As she turns back, he catches her arm.

"Wait, Scherbatsky."

She turns around, slowly.

"What?"

He flashes his big, blue eyes in her direction, and she can easily see how they enchant women into sleeping with him. "Can't we make this work? Just for a day?"

She sighs.

" _Fine._ "

He's all too quick to take his arms off her and he bounces a little on the balls of his feet, grinning, "Great! So where are we working?"

"I regret this already."

Twenty minutes later and he's fiddling with flasks and barely even looking her in the eye (again).

"Barney, I'm telling you, if you don't wear gloves you're gonna end up—"

"Whoa ho ho, looks who thinks she's my mother now. I never saw you as the motherly type, Scherbatsky."

"Stop calling me that!" She says, "And I'm _not._ "

"Why can't I call you Scherbatsky, Scherbatsky? What's the big deal?" he says.

"The _deal_ is that I don't want you getting any ideas that there's any intimacy between us at all."

This time he looks over at her, eyes flashing, and he offers her a wink that makes something in her stomach twist sideways. "Trust me, Scherbatsky, if there was any _intimacy_ between us, this is not what we'd be doing right now."

"I'm afraid to ask," she mutters. Her eyebrows lift, "But tell me, what would we be doing?"

"You're a cunning one, Scherbatsky. Just think, maybe dimmer lighting, perhaps a slightly more _horizontal_ —"

"I was right. I shouldn't have asked."

"Don't be so sullen, Scherbatsky," he says, clinking glasses together, liquid sloshing over the sides, "We're having fun, aren't we?"

"Correction, you're having fun. I'm sitting here doing all the _actual_ work. And I swear to God, Barney, if you're not careful you're going to—"

" _Agghh!_ "

Robin blinks in the sudden cloud of pink smoke and moves a hand over her lips to mask the laugh that bubbles forth at the sight of Barney, sprawled on the floor, screaming like some little kid.

And all hell breaks loose when he sits up, dazed, his hair a flaming bright colour of—

— _pink._

"What the hell were you even putting in these flasks?!" she says.

"I don't know!" he cries. "It said, danger, high risk of something or other—it was an instant attraction! That's chemistry, isn't it?!"

"No! That's _dumbassery._ "

"Don't insult me, Scherbatsky, just _fix it!_ "

Robin sets the flasks aside and tries her _absolute hardest_ not to burst into laughter as she helps him to his feet. "Okay, uhm, _Barney—_ just, uh, just calm down, okay? Everything's alright."

"I said _fix it,_ Scherbatsky!"

She lets loose one rowdy laugh, and he promptly starts glaring. "I don't think I can!"

Lily comes running up behind them, "I heard a crash, what the hell are you guys even—oh— _oh my God._ "

"This isn't funny!" Barney screeches.

Marshall comes up, his hands at Lily's shoulders, and he's grinning, "Ask anybody, dude. This is _funny._ "

"Okay, Lily, Marshall, you are _not_ helping—" Robin says, breaking away from Barney to throw them glares, "Barney, okay, just calm down…"

Ted rushes in. "What the hell is going on—?!"

He stops, raising a hand to his mouth. He gets out a laugh, "Oh my God."

" _This is not funny, Mosby!"_

"You're damn right it's not funny. This is _hysterical._ "

Marshall kisses the side of Lily's head, "This is going to be the highlight of the year. Of the century."

And as Ted sits his kids down to tell his kids the stories of his younger years, sure enough, it still is.


End file.
